Paris Has Burned

By JESSE GREEN

Published: April 18, 1993

LOOKING like endangered birds, the drag queens tottered on their heels as they entered -- "a bit early in the day for we girls," said one. It was noon on a recent Saturday at the Sound Factory Bar on West 21st Street, and they were attending a memorial for Angie Xtravaganza. One of her children, Hector Xtravaganza, kept breaking down in tears. "It's not just her, it's all of them," he said. "My entire gay childhood is disintegrating before my eyes." Indeed, as some of the 100 mourners rose to reminisce, it was as if their whole world, the world of drag queens and voguing and ecstatic, elaborate balls, had died along with Angie.

Though she was only 27, Angie had been a mother more than a dozen times. Not in the usual way; she was biologically male. "But a mother is one who raises a child, not one who borns it," Hector pointed out. And as mother of the House of Xtravaganza, Angie had taken many rejected, wayward, even homeless children under her wing; she had fed them, observed their birthdays, taught them all about "walking the balls." Competing in categories like High-Fashion Eveningwear and Alexis vs. Krystle, Angie was legendary, a Queen among queens, achieving in fantasy what the world had denied her in reality.

Drag balls, the product of a poor, gay and mostly nonwhite culture, had been held in Harlem since the 1920's. But it wasn't until Jennie Livingston's award-winning documentary, "Paris Is Burning," was released in 1991 that anyone outside that world knew much about them. By then it was almost too late. For Angie Xtravaganza, such fame as she achieved in the two years following the film's release could not be savored: the AIDS-related liver disease that eventually killed her was already destroying her hard-won femininity. "She had spots all over, like a Dalmatian," Hector said. "And she had to stop taking the hormones that made her look soft, because they're what really ate her up." In later pictures, you can see the masculine lines of her face re-emerging despite the high collars and makeup.

But it wasn't just Angie. Before filming was even completed in 1989, her "main daughter," Venus, a frail transsexual who in the movie dreamed of marriage and a home "in the Peekskills," was found strangled under a bed in a hotel. Since then, Kim Pendavis, filmed sewing his costumes, has died of a heart attack though he was only in his 20's. Of nine featured players, five are gone or going.

Paris is no longer burning. It has burned. And not only because of the casualties. No one needs to go to a ball to see drag anymore: Dame Edna Everage has television specials, Ru Paul mugs on the covers of magazines, fashion shows feature drag acts on the runway. No one needs to go to a ball to see voguing either, not since Madonna gobbled it up, appropriating two Xtravaganzas in the process. Once mainstream America began to copy a subculture that was copying it, the subculture itself was no longer of interest to a wider audience, and whatever new opportunites existed for the principals dried up. After one show last year at the jazz club Sweetwaters, Octavia St. Laurent, for instance, returned to dancing behind glass at the Show Palace. And the balls, which had moved downtown in their moment of fame, have mostly moved back to Harlem.

The film's critical and financial success should therefore not be taken for the success of its subjects. "The truth is, though I didn't get rich, I am now a film maker," said Ms. Livingston, 31. "And that's something I wasn't before. It doesn't mean it's easy to get money. But I am educated and I am white so I have the ability to write those grants and push my little body through whatever door I need to get it through."

And drag queens can't. "If they wanted to make a film about themselves, they would not be able," said Ms. Livingston, who grew up in Los Angeles and is a graduate of Yale University. "I wish that weren't so, but that's the way society is structured." In fact, other than Willi Ninja, the movie's star dancer, who has stitched together a career including choreography, fashion and music, the characters Ms. Livingston presented remain, at best, where they were when filmed.

Angie Xtravaganza's memorial made that all too plain. A shrine had been set up in the back of the room: flowers, photographs and, on a pedestal, a pair of Angie's favorite earrings. Behind them stood a huge funeral wreath, a giant X of blood-red carnations that seemed to stand for more than Xtravanganza. Almost unnoticed was a simple basket of white and purple lilies. "To all who loved Angie," the florist's card read. It was from Ms. Livingston and her co-producer, Barry Swimar, who were in England to raise money for new projects, including a satirical drama about the way movies depict violence against women.

Perhaps it was just as well they couldn't attend. There is a lot of anger in the ball world about "Paris Is Burning." Some of it concerns what a few critics have called exploitation: making the lives of poor black and Latino people into a commodity for white consumption. "The complaint is somewhat unfounded," Ms. Livingston said, "as it was largely a gay audience, which included blacks and Latinos, that made the movie successful."